


Second Impressions

by cest_what



Category: Harry Potter - Rowling
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Gen, Kid Fic, M/M, sorting AU
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-04-09
Updated: 2010-04-09
Packaged: 2017-10-08 19:36:48
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 17,951
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/78839
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cest_what/pseuds/cest_what
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sometimes you make friends in an instant. Keeping them is a lot harder. (Kidfic.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Second Impressions

**Author's Note:**

> 1) This is a remix of the Slytherin!Harry If from _The If Sieve_. It's not actually set in the same universe/multiverse, and you don't need to have read the one to understand the other. But if you have, you'll probably care more.
> 
> 2) Thank you to my beta scrtkpr.
> 
> 3) Originally posted to [LJ](http://cest-what.livejournal.com/14523.html) September 2008.

The shop bell sounded with a clear, soft chime. Draco looked around, shifting on his stool, and the robemaker kneeling at his feet hissed and grabbed at a pin to keep it from jabbing into his calf.

"Hold still, dear," she murmured, voice muffled around the three other pins held between her lips.

A boy had eased the shop door open. He was holding it in one hand, hesitating on the threshold. He was dressed in Muggle clothes: a shirt that was too big for him and blue trousers with tatty hems that trailed over his shoes. Draco hadn't seen Muggle clothes very often, but these were definitely the most raggedy ones he'd come across. He was fascinated by the idea that you could go out in clothes like that, which Narcissa wouldn't even have let Draco climb trees in.

Not that Draco climbed trees any more, obviously. That was something kids did.

Madam Malkin had been doing something at the counter, but she bustled forwards now, smiling.

"Er," the new boy said. He blinked at her from under a messy black fringe.

"Hogwarts, dear?"

Draco bet that he was another first year. He bet they'd be in classes together. Maybe they'd be Sorted into the same house. (Slytherin; it had to be Slytherin.)

Madam Malkin told the new boy that there was "another young man being fitted up just now," and Draco inspected his trailing unpinned sleeve, pretending he hadn't been looking.

The boy followed Madam Malkin down to the back of the shop, where she set up another stool next to Draco's. The boy looked uncertain, but also determined. Draco had been brought in by his mother, and she was coming back to collect him after she'd talked to Gringotts, but this boy was obviously quite used to doing things on his own.

Draco looked at the uncaring messy hair and the straight line of his back, and wanted badly to impress him.

Madam Malkin dropped a malformed black robe over the new boy's head – one as enormous and flapping as Draco's own.

"Hullo," Draco said as soon as the boy was visible again. "Hogwarts too?" He made his voice a drawl.

"Yes," the boy said shortly.

Draco wanted to keep up the drawl, but he was too excited. He changed tack, deciding to make the boy laugh instead.

"Don't you feel like a Dementor or something, in these robes?" Draco asked. He waved one arm with its acres of black sleeve and made a low, creepy _Whoooh_ sound.

The other boy looked a bit confused, but he laughed anyway. Draco was encouraged.

He waved his arms again, both of them this time, causing the witch pinning his hem to tell him to keep still again. He ignored her in favour of putting on a sepulchral voice that he'd been practising on Vince and Gregory. "Come closer, child. Your soul will be _tasty_. Come and let me kiss you to death."

The boy choked on startled laughter. "Did you say _kiss_?"

"Didn't you know that Dementors kiss you?" Draco asked. He'd only learned about it a few months ago from Phoebe Goyle, who'd been trying to scare him and Gregory (which was ridiculous, they were practically at school, they weren't going to be scared by stories). Draco leaned closer, relishing his role of more knowledgeable one. "Kissing is how they suck out your _soul_." He drew out the final word, enjoying it.

The other boy's eyes had widened. "They do?"

Draco nodded. He didn't actually know much more, but he was willing to make it up. "They put a shrivelled dead hand on your shoulder, then when you turn around they suck out your soul and _crunch_. And then they pick bits of soul out of their teeth, and anyone who sees them knows that you don't have a soul any more, and you just dribble and stuff."

The new boy had leaned forward too far while he listened. Madam Malkin steadied him as he wobbled on his stool. He leaned back again, looking abashed. "Do they suck out people's souls a lot?" he asked, obviously unable to leave this topic alone. He looked wary, and Draco wondered if he imagined Dementors might ever come near him. That would be cool, but you never met Dementors, everybody knew that. They all stayed at Azkaban.

"They only do it to convicted criminals," Draco admitted. "And my father says that only fools and villains get convicted of anything by the Wizengamot."

The boy frowned. "What do you need to do to get – to have that happen?"

Draco shrugged. "I suppose kill someone." His eyes caught movement outside the window, and he raised his eyebrows. "I say, look at that man!"

The boy turned to see where he was looking, at the enormous hulk of a man who was blocking out the light from the street. He had two hugely piled ice cream cones in his hands, and he was grinning and mugging furiously.

"That's Hagrid," the other boy said, sounding pleased. "He works at Hogwarts."

"Oh, right," Draco said. He'd heard about Hagrid. They said he was practically a Squib and about as bright as a candle and you could do anything and he couldn't do anything about it.

"He gave my cousin Dudley a tail," the boy added, satisfaction lacing his tone.

Draco blinked, and revised his opinion of Hagrid. A tail wasn't all that scary, but it was pretty embarrassing. "Do you think ... will he give the students tails, do you think?"

"Only the awful ones, I imagine," the boy said.

"Oh good." Draco relaxed, but determined that Hagrid was going to like him. It was clearly dangerous for you if he didn't. "Well, I suppose your cousin deserved it," he added, fairly.

The boy scowled, his hair falling into his eyes as he ducked his head. "He _did_," he said fiercely. "He's horrible. The only person in the world who's more horrible is my Uncle Vernon."

Draco blinked again. "... I have an aunt who's mad," he offered, feeling inadequate.

Madam Malkin finished up and got to her feet, lifting the robe off the new boy. "That's you done, my dear," she said, smiling at him.

"Oh! Um, thank you," the boy said, hopping down off the stool.

"What's your name?" Draco asked as he started to turn away.

The boy turned back around, flattening his fringe against his forehead. "Er, Harry," he said. "Harry Potter."

Draco felt his mouth drop open. He dragged his eyes over the tatty Muggle clothes and the straight back and the messy hair. Then he smiled because he couldn't help it, huge and beaming. "I'm Draco Malfoy," he said. "I'll see you at Hogwarts, I expect."

*

The weeks before term started felt like the longest in Draco's life. His robes arrived, and he put them on and wore them all afternoon, but there was no one there to see him except Mother and Father and the house-elves. He read some of his Potions textbook, because Father said that Professor Snape was an old associate and Draco thought that might mean Draco ought to impress him. And he imagined meeting up with Harry Potter again at school. Mother offered to invite Vince or Gregory over to stay, but they weren't a very interesting prospect compared to Harry Potter.

Draco almost wrote him a letter once, because the shopkeeper had said that his new owl would be able to find anyone in Britain, with just their name. He thought he might open the letter with that:

_Hey, Potter,_

_So the shopkeeper says this owl of mine can find anybody – but who knows if you can trust tradesmen's boasts, right?_

He thought that struck the right airy note, but then he couldn't think of what he'd write afterwards. So he thought he wouldn't write at all.

He was up before dawn on the first day of term. He told the sleepy house-elf who answered his clap that no, he didn't want to wear the blue robes, he'd be wearing his school robes this morning, thank you.

Soffy picked up the robes and burst into tears. "Master Draco is so grown up!" she cried.

Draco was a bit embarrassed, but mostly pleased.

"Be quiet, Soffy." He thought about adding, "And punish yourself for this shameful display," because that was what Father would have said, but then he was in too good a mood to actually do it.

Mother yawned when he went to find her, and told him that it was far too early and the train wouldn't leave until eleven o'clock. She and Father took so long getting ready that Draco was convinced they were going to miss the train anyway.

On the platform, Narcissa fussed with Draco's collar while he tried to see over people's heads without actually going up on his toes – which would be childish.

"Can you see Harry Potter?"

"I don't know what he looks like, dear," Narcissa said. "Do you have your wand?"

"Obviously," Draco said, distracted. Then, "He should be here."

There were students in black robes with luggage and groups of harried-looking parents milling all around them. Most of the students were older than Draco, but some were obviously first years too. Draco spotted a few kids he'd seen at Ministry functions and things, but not the one he was looking for.

"I'm pleased that you've made a friend of the Potter boy," Lucius said, putting his hand on Draco's shoulder. "He may prove to be a powerful ally to you at Hogwarts." Draco twisted to look up at him. "But make sure that you do not let him lead too much," Lucius added. "I wouldn't like to think that my son was a follower at school."

Draco squared his shoulders. "He didn't seem to know very much," he said. "I can teach him about things, sir."

Lucius smiled. "Yes, I think that would be desirable."

Now Father approved of him. This was going to be the best year ever.

Draco spotted Vince and Gregory and waved them over. They ploughed a path through the other students, looking relieved to see him.

"Hullo, Crabbe, Goyle," Draco said.

They looked confused. "Um, Draco?" Vince asked, shifting his feet.

"Malfoy," Draco said. "We're at school now," he explained. "You're supposed to call each other by your surnames at school. Only people with no class still use first names like little kids."

"Okay, Malfoy," Gregory said. Draco beamed at him.

Then he saw the boy who'd just come onto the platform through the Muggle barrier. He was still wearing Muggle clothes, but he was towing a suitcase with a large owl cage atop it. It didn't look as though anyone had put a lightening spell on the suitcase – he was puffing as he stopped and stood next to it, looking around the platform. He looked a bit overwhelmed.

Draco left his suitcase with his parents.

"Potter!" he called, when he got close. He put his hands in the pockets of his black robes, lounging and cool.

Harry looked up, his face brightening.

"I was hoping I'd see you here," he said gruffly. Draco beamed at him and gave up on looking cool.

"I said you would," he said.

Harry nodded, biting his lip. "I didn't even know how to get onto the platform," he confided. "I had to ask this wizard family how."

He nodded awkwardly at someone over Draco's shoulder. Draco twisted around, and saw a red-headed boy looking back. Draco thought he was the youngest Weasley – the one that wasn't a girl. Weasley tilted his head and gave Harry a half smile, and for a moment it looked as though he was going to come over. Draco gave him a flat stare until he changed his mind.

"Come on," Draco said, turning back to Harry, "let's go get a carriage. All the good ones will be gone, otherwise."

*

Draco was too excited to sit still on the way to Hogwarts. Potter bought so much food from the tray that Draco had to buy just as much to compete, and their compartment ended up practically flooded with Chocolate Frogs and pumpkin pasties and other things. Vince and Gregory could eat anything, though, so it wasn't like any of it went to waste.

Draco did impersonations of people Potter didn't know, and Potter laughed anyway – Gregory laughed so much he choked on his drink and nearly threw up, but Draco had always been able to make Gregory laugh, so that was less impressive. People kept stopping at their compartment door and then hanging around the outside, and Draco wasn't sure whether it was because they were laughing at Draco's impressions or because they wanted Harry to show them his scar, but it hardly mattered. Between them they were going to rule the school.

By the time they got to Hogwarts, the only thing that was still a nervous knot in Draco's stomach was the thought that he might not get into Slytherin.

Malfoys were always in Slytherin. Every Malfoy ever had been in Slytherin, and if they hadn't then they were never mentioned by their descendants, and Draco didn't want to be the Malfoy nobody ever mentioned.

He also didn't want to imagine Lucius's expression if he was put into Hufflepuff or something.

Potter asked about how the Sorting worked while they were waiting in the little entrance hall for Professor McGonagall to call them through.

"It's a ... test of some kind, I think," Draco said. "To see what sort of person you are." He lifted his chin. "I'll be in Slytherin, of course. That's the house for people who are going to be influential: ambitious, intelligent people who know how to network and know what's important."

Harry fiddled with the hem of his sleeve. "Hagrid said that Slytherin..." He glanced at Draco, changing his mind. "Er, never mind. He probably didn't mean it like I thought. But what if there's no house for you? If you don't fit in any of them?"

Draco scoffed. "They just put you in Hufflepuff if they can't find anywhere else for you; everybody knows that."

A girl with a long, pale braid turned to look at him over her shoulder. "That's not true," she said calmly. "Hufflepuffs are Sorted because they understand loyalty and hard work. That's what Helga Hufflepuff wanted from her students: true worth."

"No, Malfoy's right," another boy butted in – a dark-skinned, handsome boy Draco remembered seeing with his mother at a few functions. They'd never spoken, but Draco was pleased that the other boy had remembered his name. "The Sorting Hat's song has said in the past that Hufflepuff's for people who don't fit anywhere else, and just get dumped." He gave the girl with the pale braid an amused, supercilious look. "Your ancestral house is the official Misfit Dumping Ground, Bones."

Draco frowned. This boy knew _everybody's_ name, then, and he was clearly not expecting to be in Hufflepuff. Draco would have to keep an eye on him – he could be difficult to keep in check.

Draco glanced back at Potter, who was frowning more steadily now, and gazing at the supercilious boy – Zabali? Something like that, Draco thought – with dislike. Draco was sort of pleased.

"Don't worry," Draco hissed. "Seriously, there's no way they'd put you in Hufflepuff."

Potter nodded, and flashed him a quick smile. He was in school robes, now, like the rest of them, and they suited him more than the scrappy Muggle clothes he'd been wearing. His hair was still messy, but that sort of suited him too, in a way that Draco could never have got away with. Draco tucked his hands into his pockets and nudged Harry's shoulder, feeling obscurely less anxious now that he'd reassured Harry.

The house debate was broken up when a host of castle ghosts floated through the wall, and after that McGonagall called them through.

There was a hat on a chair. It sang – very badly, and Draco wanted to giggle – and apparently they were supposed to try it on.

It seemed to take forever to get to the M's. Draco thought they could have called them in a better order than alphabetically. Youngest to oldest, maybe. Except no, Draco didn't especially want the fact that he was one of the youngest in the class called to everyone's attention. Some other way, then.

They got there eventually, and the hat had barely touched Draco's head before it was shouting "SLYTHERIN!"

Draco's legs were shaky with relief as he got up and made his way over to the Slytherin table. Vince and Gregory had saved him a seat; obviously they hadn't had any doubts. Draco gave them a bright, wobbly grin and dropped onto the bench next to Vince.

The next five students were all Sorted into other houses, and then a girl called Pansy Parkinson was made another Slytherin. Then a girl called Patil, and then _another_ girl called Patil who looked exactly like the first one, so that Draco began to think they were going to go on forever and they'd never get to Potter.

Then McGonagall called "Potter, Harry!" and the entire hall broke out in whispers.

Draco leaned forward, fixing his eyes on the other boy. If Harry was nervous now, he wasn't showing it. Draco felt a burst of smug pride at how determined he looked as he walked up to the stool and sat down.

They waited, and they waited, and the whispering broke out again. Finally the hat shouted out "SLYTHERIN."

"Yes!" Draco cried, the shout lost in the rest of the cheering erupting from their table. Draco shook his fist in the air and turned to punch Vince in the shoulder. Vince was still blinking and shell-shocked with relief at having been Sorted right himself, but Gregory was grinning from ear to ear with excitement.

McGonagall, Draco noticed, looked rather shell-shocked herself. She took the hat back from Potter with a very blank face, and glanced towards Professor Dumbledore at the Staff Table as though she couldn't help herself.

Dumbledore just twinkled at her, the way he always did on Chocolate Frog cards.

Harry dropped onto the bench beside Draco, grinning sheepishly under all the shouts and pats on the back he was getting.

"Why did it take so long?" Draco hissed.

Harry shrugged. "It was ... I don't know, it was making up its mind," he said. "It sounded like it wanted to put me everywhere at once." He fiddled with his sleeve and looked at Draco, then away again, smiling and then colouring as he said, "But, uh, it said Slytherin could be good for me, and I knew you were here, so..."

Draco felt as though all his veins were fizzing with happiness. He leaned back, folding his arms behind his head. "Slytherin's the best house," he said. "You'll see."

There were two other new Slytherin boys: the dark-skinned boy with the lip curl – who was actually called Zabini, Draco had found out during the Sorting – and another boy called Nott. They gathered into a group around Draco and the others as the Feast went on, talking loudly over the racket in the hall and trading stories about getting ready for school. They were still trading them when the feast ended and they tramped down to the Slytherin common room (so cool, like a dungeon or something) and then down the shorter flight of stairs that the spiky-haired prefect pointed them to.

Potter was in the middle of telling them about Hagrid bringing him his Hogwarts letter at a shack in the middle of the ocean when they crowded through the door into the dorm.

"That was seriously how you got your letter?" Zabini asked.

"Wicked," Nott said.

Potter grinned, turning around on the spot to look at their dorm. Draco put his hands behind his head and strolled over to the bed with his suitcase at its foot. The heavy brocaded green curtains were a bit over the top, but it looked like you could bunch them back up to the bed head if you wanted to be able to talk to people from your bed. It looked comfortable, if not as private as he was used to. But that could be cool – they could talk to each other at night.

Harry was gazing at the landscape paintings around the walls. Draco wasn't sure what he saw that was special – it was just clouds floating about and some mermaids flipping their tails off in the distance, in the one he was looking at – but Harry sounded happy and distracted as he replied to Zabini, "Yeah, my aunt and uncle didn't want me to get it." He shrugged, turning around again, and sat down on his own bed. He smoothed the coverlets. "I thought they'd be happy to get rid of me, but they don't like magic much."

Draco sat on the end of his own bed and leaned against the bed post, drawing his knees up. "That doesn't make any sense," he objected. "Why wouldn't they like magic? It was probably something else."

Harry tucked his legs beneath him. He looked doubtful. "I think they just really didn't like it. Uncle Vernon thought it was freakish."

Draco blinked. A Muggle thought _magic_ was freakish? With their weird dangerous appliances and their strange clothes and their squallor? "That's weird," he said, frowning.

"The owls must have tried to deliver your letter, though," Nott said. He'd flopped onto his stomach on his bed, his chin in his hands.

Harry grinned. "They _tried_," he said. "The house was _covered_ in owls, there were about two hundred of them, but my aunt and uncle had all the doors and windows barred. Once a whole pile came down the chimney, but they wouldn't let me catch one of them. They wouldn't even let Dudley see one – he sulked all day."

Gregory's eyes were wide. "You got hundreds of letters?" he asked.

Draco kicked him in the leg. "They all said the same thing, you idiot. It's not like you need to envy him."

Potter shrugged, unfolding his legs and flopping back against the headboard. "They might have," he said, a curl of a smile in his voice. "I don't know, do I? They might have all been – I don't know, spells or ... or nursery rhymes or something."

Draco snickered. "I bet Dumbledore _would_ do that." He moved to sit sideways, miming writing at a desk, and copied Dumbledore's voice. "Dear Harry Potter. I thought it important to let you know that Minnie Malter was a Squib, and Matthew Muggle broke her rib. Minnie's brother wasn't pleased, so Matthew left without his knees."

Zabini laughed with the others, but threw his pillow at Draco and asked if he could still recite all his nursery rhymes like a good boy.

"Are there lots of Wizard nursery rhymes about Muggles?" Potter asked, his voice curious.

Draco put his head to the side. "Do you really not know anything about Wizard life? Not even nursery rhymes?"

Harry shrugged, picking at his coverlets. "How would I? I didn't know wizards existed until this summer. I..." He looked up, biting his lip. "Everyone's already going to know everything, aren't they? Even that girl Hermione on the train – she said her parents were Muggles, but she'd already read all our textbooks and she knew all this stuff, and she'd done spells that worked. I'm going to be the only one who doesn't know anything."

Zabini shrugged. "Nah, I think there are always a few Muggle-born kids every year. Didn't one of the new Slytherin girls say she was?"

Draco looked at his fingernails. "They shouldn't let any in at all," he said. "That's what Father says. He says that they're diluting our culture with their ignorance." At the last moment he heard what he was saying, and his eyes flew to Harry. "Er, I mean – there are probably quite a few. Father says it's a disgrace, so there must be. And anyway, we'll teach you!" He smiled wide. "You won't be ignorant, because we'll tell you everything. You'll know loads more than that priggish Muggle girl."

Potter was giving him an odd look. Still, he nodded, slowly. "All right," he said.

Nott scrambled upright, interested. "What do you want to know?"

Potter hesitated. "Hagrid told me a bit about ... Voldemort," he said.

Draco blinked. Nott had scooted backwards, he noticed, and Zabini had straightened up so fast he banged his elbow on his bed post. Vince and Gregory were looking scared. Draco gave them a scathing look. People were being ridiculous. The Dark Lord wasn't dinner table conversation, but it was only peasants who were superstitiously frightened to mention him, Lucius had told Draco.

"You want to know about You Know Who," Nott said blankly. Potter looked between the five of them, finally settling on Draco (who wasn't being an idiot).

"Hagrid already told me a bit," Potter said. "But ... well, on the train everybody wanted me to show them my scar. They all knew about how Voldemort tried to kill me, and how it was this amazing thing that he couldn't. It just ... it feels stupid that everybody knows so much more about it than me. And ... and he killed my parents. I want to know."

Draco nodded, thinking. He propped his chin on his knee. "Well, he disappeared when I was one," he said. "Sometimes the _Daily Prophet_ prints rubbish about how he's not truly gone, but Father says he definitely is. He was too powerful a wizard to ever hide away, so the only reason he'd disappear was if he was truly dead."

"I guess ... good, then," Harry said. "Hagrid talked about him as if he was Darth Vader or something." They looked at him. Harry looked around and amended that to, "Er, I mean, as if he was really evil. Totally evil."

Draco made a face. "He wasn't evil," he said. "Only the newspapers and people like Dumbledore say he was evil. That's what Father says. He says that the Dark Lord had some good ideas. He just took them too far, and that was why he failed."

Potter stared at him. Draco shifted on the bed.

"He killed my parents," Potter said slowly.

Draco hesitated. "Well, yes," he said. "Only ... Father says that he was working from sound principles." Potter was still staring at him, but Draco was more sure of himself now. "Father says that the Ministry has become dangerously liberal, and that the end of it will be the erosion of Wizarding society and its crumble in the face of Muggle debasement and violence. He says that the Dark Lord was one of the only people to recognise that and act to do something about it, before everything became completely contaminated."

Nott, who hadn't been talking very much, burst in now. He looked upset. "Well, _my_ Father says that all the people who supported You Knew Who were young fools who should have known better, and nearly all of them regretted it!"

Draco gave him a dismissive look. "The ones who went to Azkaban did, I expect."

Potter's face twisted. "He _killed_ my parents," he said again. "What does that have to do with ... with sound principles or ... or contamination? Or was it all right because my mother was Muggle-born?"

Draco hesitated. "My father says ... he says that the Dark Lord went too far, but it was in the right direction," he said. "He says that ... that to be respected, you have to be feared, and you can't afford to be squeamish about things."

Potter's cheeks had reddened with anger. "Oh?" he said. "Well, my father's _dead_, but if he was alive he'd say that yours was talking total _crap_, Draco."

Draco saw red. "Take that back."

Harry's expression was angry and steady. "Why?" he said. "You just said that Voldemort was right to try to _murder_ me when I was a baby."

Draco stared at him. "I ... didn't," he said. Potter laughed, derisive. "But if I did, maybe it's true!" Draco said.

"Er," Nott said. Draco and Harry both ignored him.

"Sometimes you have to do things everybody else is afraid to do!" Draco said.

Harry's fists dug into the comforter beneath him. "I'm sorry I didn't die, then," he said. "I'm sure that would have made you happy!"

He stared at Draco for a moment longer. Draco stared back, angry and desperate and with no idea how they'd got here. Then Potter grabbed his curtains and drew them jerkily closed.

Draco couldn't bring himself to move. After a while the others began to quietly get ready for bed around him.

"This is going to be interesting," Zabini murmured to Nott, his voice amused.

Draco couldn't even look at him. He stared at his knees. Then Vince had turned out the lights and he stared at the darkness.

There was an awful, sick, tight feeling in his stomach. He couldn't make it go away.

*

Draco was woken by a pillow landing on his face.

"First class at eight thirty, Malfoy," Zabini drawled. "Breakfast starts at seven."

Draco scrubbed the back of one hand over eyes gummy with sleep. He wasn't sure why Zabini had appointed himself first year alarm clock. Dropping his hand and pushing onto his elbows, Draco focused on Zabini, and decided that the other boy was enjoying the role too much.

"Put a sock in it, Zabini," Nott's muffled voice came from a humped tangle of bedclothes. It was followed by a noise of protest as a pillow thumped onto his head.

Zabini had tugged back everybody's curtains before he woke them, because he clearly had a cat's respect for privacy.

Vince was already awake and dressed, sitting quietly against the headboard of his bed, but Gregory was as bad at waking up as Draco was. He was buried under his blankets, ignoring everything around him.

Potter was rubbing at his eyes, blinking at the light. His hair was sticking up in every direction, and falling into his eyes at the same time.

For a moment Draco wanted to smile at him. He almost made a joke about Potter's hair. Then the night before came back, like a chill creeping down his shoulders. Draco turned away, adjusting his pyjama top, which had got twisted around while he slept. When he turned back, Potter had found his glasses and was getting out of bed.

"Come on," Potter said to Zabini. "The showers are through here, aren't they?"

As they went by, Potter gave Draco one brief, unconcerned glance. Draco gave it back to him, raising his eyebrows a bit, the way Lucius did.

As soon as they were gone, Draco rolled onto his stomach. "I hate the world," he mumbled.

Vince padded over. "It's breakfast soon," he offered. He prodded Draco. "My dad says the breakfasts here are really good."

*

Draco didn't think breakfast was all that brilliant. They didn't have his favourite sourdough bread, and he didn't like pumpkin juice.

Potter was sitting with Nott and Zabini, further down the table. The three of them were huddled together, discussing something. As Draco watched, Nott said something and Potter looked up and grinned, shoving his shoulder. Nott grinned back, self-conscious, and stole one of Zabini's pieces of toast.

"My grandmother," a girl's voice at Draco's left observed, "says that staring at famous people is like wearing an enormous sign saying that you have no class at all."

Draco turned to look at her. She was a dark-haired girl he remembered vaguely from the Sorting. She had a funny squashed nose and an insolent tilt to her mouth.

"I suppose your grandmother would know?" Draco asked, as dismissively as he could.

The girl lowered her lashes over a smirk. "She would, actually," she said. "She was ever so famous. She was the first witch to be a war correspondent for the _Prophet_, over in Europe and places in the Grindelwald War."

Draco blinked at her. She raised her lashes again, looking at him. "You're Draco Malfoy, aren't you?" she said. "Why were you staring at Harry Potter?"

"His face annoys me," Draco said flatly. He struggled for a moment. "And it does _not_ count if somebody's actually living in your dorm. That's not staring at famous people – and anyway, who are you?"

"Oh, it does count," she said. "Um. And I'm Pansy Parkinson." She traced a finger over the table cloth in front of her, and he realised, with a shock, that she might actually be a bit shy. "I was the first Slytherin to get Sorted after you, you know."

"Oh," Draco said. He paused. "What's the girls' dorm like?"

Pansy waved a hand, which Draco noticed had bright pink nail polish on it. "It's strange not having any windows," she said, "but the paintings are nice. There's one of a herd of unicorns on the steppes that..." She trailed off at Draco's smirk. "Oh, shut up." She coloured. "Unicorns are cool."

"Ours has a herd of Thestrals," Draco said. "They're tearing apart a stag. There's blood and guts shining on their teeth and everywhere."

Pansy looked fascinated and appalled at the same time. But she lifted her chin, recovering her cool. "You can't even see Thestrals, Malfoy."

Draco took a bite of eggs and toast, looking mysterious.

"I don't believe you," she said. She sounded uncertain, though.

Draco noticed that Harry was looking at him. There was a tight, miserable expression on his face that sort of made Draco want to go over there and ... and hit him, or something.

"I'm not sure what it means when famous people stare back at you," Pansy Parkinson said meditatively.

"He's not that famous," Draco said, turning back to his food. His throat hurt when he said it.

*

The first class for the day was Transfiguration, which was a little bit cool at first, when Professor McGonagall turned her desk into a goose, and then back again.

"It still looks a bit goosish," Pansy whispered next to Draco. "Don't you think? Around the feet?"

Draco coughed and walked his fingers over the desk behind the shelter of their textbooks, miming a desk waddling along. Pansy giggled. McGonagall gave them a flat look, and Draco concentrated virtuously on the match on the desk in front of him. "I think that my match has gone a bit silver, Professor," he offered, to Pansy's eye roll. "It looks a bit like a needle, now."

McGonagall came over and looked at it. "Practise the wand glide again, Mr Malfoy; you haven't quite got it," she said quellingly.

Potter gave him a brief, disgusted look, then went back to ignoring him.

Draco prodded at his match with his wand. It was a stupid exercise anyway.

After Transfiguration was Charms, which was even more stupid, since the Professor fell off his perch when he got to Harry's name on the register. Harry looked desperately embarrassed. Draco wanted to lean close to his ear and make a joke about Flitwick so that he laughed instead of flattening his fringe and trying to sink under his desk.

Instead Draco turned to Pansy and said, just loud enough for everyone to hear, "Oh, is that Harry _Potter_? I had no idea."

"Shut up, Malfoy," Potter said, curling his fists on his desk.

"Now, now," Professor Flitwick said, settling himself at the top of his pile of books once again. "We mustn't, that is to say, get excited about having a celebrity in our midst. All students are equal here, you know!"

Draco rolled his eyes. Potter was trying to hide behind his desk again. Zabini reached down and tugged him straight. "Greet your fans, Potter," he murmured, and Potter rolled his eyes and shoved him. "Are you offering to be my publicity manager?" he asked, his voice a threat.

"I'd love to," Zabini replied. Draco wished that Flitwick would shut them up, but the professor was busy trying to find his place in the text.

Potter stared at Zabini. Then he shook his head, grinning. "You are a ginormous git," he said quietly. "Don't you dare."

*

Draco was still pretending to himself that it would all come right, or that he didn't care, or both, when they got to the free period after lunch. He and Vince and Gregory had decided to try to get to the top of the Astronomy Tower – partly because they had a class there on Wednesday night and they needed to work out how to get there, but mostly because it was the tallest tower and they wanted to see how far you could see from the top.

The staircases seemed to get more temperamental the higher you got, though. Draco found himself pitying the Ravenclaws and Gryffindors who had to find their way down through all these floors every day.

"They need _maps_," Draco complained, leaning on Vince at the bottom of yet another staircase. "Or ropes or something, so that you can swing up to the landing if the staircase starts to move. My father's on the school board, I should bully him into suggesting it."

Gregory gave him an uncertain look, probably at the idea of Draco successfully bullying Lucius into doing anything at all. Draco ignored him, leaning on Vince some more. Vince was a solid, uncomplaining support.

"I think we need to go right some more," Vince said slowly.

They turned down the right hand corridor. This did look like the right direction, actually – there were tapestries of stargazing centaurs along the wall, for one.

"I think..." Draco started, then trailed off. He'd just noticed the three boys sitting with their legs sprawled into the walkway, near the other end of the corridor. They were leaning their backs against another tapestry, and they had what looked like about fifty chocolate frog cards spread out over the floor in front of them. There were no wrappers, so it must have been somebody's collection. By the way Nott was leaning forward, adjusting one crooked card, Draco assumed the collection was his.

"No, this one's Nimue," Nott was saying. "She's from the Merlin set, she's worth a _mint_, actually."

"Wait," Harry said, putting down the card he'd been looking at and picking up another. "I thought you said this one was Nimue?"

Zabini glanced over. "No, that's Neffrety," he said. "She's much more recent – she only died a few hundred years ago. She was an Arithmantic scholar – she discovered the Neffret Sequence."

"She has some value as a curiosity, but she's not worth as much," Nott said.

"Why's she carrying..." Harry started, lifting his head. Then he noticed Draco and the others. They'd been walking more and more slowly as they got closer.

"Potter," Draco said uncertainly. He nodded at Nott and Zabini, but didn't say anything to them.

"Malfoy," Harry said. He sounded unfriendly.

"What are you doing?" Draco asked.

"None of your business," Harry said. Then, more heatedly, "Nothing that will kill me, which I'm sure will disappoint you."

Draco could feel himself flushing. "That's ridiculous," he said. "You're being ridiculous."

Potter stood up, slowly. "_I'm_ being ridiculous?" he demanded. "You said that Voldemort was right to try to _murder_ me." He fixed his gaze on Draco. "Are you trying to apologise now, or are you just ...?"

"Malfoys don't apologise," Draco said automatically.

"Then you can get stuffed," Potter said, his expression vicious. His eyes were bright and strained. Draco felt trapped. _Sorry_, he thought. _Sorry, sorry_. He couldn't say it. He never had. And anyway, that would be saying that his father had been _wrong_, and he hadn't been, he wasn't.

"Come on," Potter said, looking back at Nott and Zabini. "Let's do this back in the common room."

"Don't bother," Draco said, stung. "We were just going."

He ploughed forward, stepping on the cards as he went. Nott cursed, his hand darting forward to rescue the Nimue card. Draco ignored him. Vince and Gregory stayed at Draco's side, and that was all that mattered.

*

Apparently Zabini and Nott were taking seriously the task of educating Potter in Wizarding life. Draco had seen them teaching Potter about Chocolate Frog Cards on Monday. On Wednesday he overheard the three of them making stealthy plans to sneak Potter out to learn flying.

"Only the Muggle-borns won't know how," Nott was saying in a low voice, while they all settled at their desks for Charms. "Plus, everybody falls off their first time on a broom."

"I'm not falling off in front of everybody," Harry said, just as low. "It's bad enough the way Snape keeps picking on me to answer things I obviously don't know – at least I can't actually fall on my bum in Potions."

Zabini slung an arm around Harry's shoulders. "That's why we're giving you lessons!" he said. "So you'll only look like a tool in front of us."

Harry grinned. "Wow," he said. "You make this lesson sound like so much fun."

Zabini shrugged. "I'm pretty bad, actually," he admitted, "so probably Theo will teach you." He grinned, a slow curl of his lips. "But at least I don't fall off."

"Draco?" Crabbe asked in a low voice. "When's our first flying lesson?"

"Thursday next week," Draco said, turning back to his own desk. He opened his textbook, then looked sideways at his friend. Vince was looking at his unopened textbook, a small frown on his forehead.

"You'll be fine," Draco said. "You haven't fallen off in ages."

Crabbe nodded. "Yeah," he said after a moment. "I guess."

Professor Flitwick found his page and looked up. Peering over his spectacles, he called for attention.

*

Draco could hear Harry and the others whispering that night, and he heard it when they decided the others were asleep and slipped out of bed, pulling their outdoor clothes on over their pyjamas. Goyle was snoring, a gentle burr, but Draco knew that Crabbe was awake too.

Draco lay in bed, listening to the soft giggles and curses as they stubbed their toes and stumbled over books, arguing in hissed whispers about the best way to get to the Quidditch shed, where the school brooms were stored. Eventually they slipped out, the door closing with a snick behind them.

Draco opened his eyes and stared at the ceiling. It was too dark to see anything but the pale smudge of the ceiling and the walls of the room. He rolled over, punching his pillow.

"Malfoy?" Vince asked, his voice quiet.

Draco didn't answer.

*

At breakfast the next morning, Zabini and Nott were jubilant and excited. Potter was almost as much so, although he was self-conscious and kept ducking his head and telling them to shut up.

"... a complete natural," Nott was saying, his cheeks flushed. "Like he was _born_ on a broomstick. When you did that twist over the lake, Harry – and remember that tree, Blaise? So awesome."

"I want to see everyone's faces," Zabini said, his smile a triumphant curl. "When we have our first flying lesson. Malfoy was going on about all the things he's done on a broom, but there's no way he's this good."

Draco couldn't even decide whether the ugly clawing of jealousy inside him was for Potter or for Nott and Zabini. He stabbed at his breakfast, silently vowing that he was going to fly so flawlessly next Thursday that everybody would be gasping. And Potter would watch him.

He wondered whether Potter could really have beeen as good as Nott and Zabini seemed to think, his first time on a broom.

"I hate flying," Pansy sighed, beside him. "It's so cold, even on sunny days, and my knees get cramped in position. And my hair gets all revolting. How many lessons do you think we'll have?" She leaned her head on Daphne Greengrass's shoulder.

"Maybe only one," Greengrass said comfortingly, leaning back.

Draco stretched. "Really," he said, "we should have flying as a regular lesson, instead of History of Magic. It's much more useful. I think I shall suggest my father mention it to the Board."

Pansy opened her eyes, wide and tragic. "I should die," she said.

Draco heard Harry giggle, the sound muffled. When Draco glanced down the table at him, Harry was back to pretending that he wasn't paying any attention to them.

*

The week seemed to stretch interminably. Classes that had been new and exciting were a drag, compared to the upcoming flying lesson. They were having it together with Gryffindor, apparently, which was rousing a competitive spirit even among the girls, who were united in their distaste for both flying and Quidditch. (Draco thought this had more to do with Pansy's unifying influence than with any actual dislike for flying on the part of Greengrass and Bulstrode.)

Pansy was particularly determined. "I happen to know that Parvati Patil doesn't fly any better than I do," she said at one point, "and Granger and Thomas are both Muggle-born, so that's them down." Then she sneered. "Not that I can imagine Granger having any grace in the air under any circumstances. She's as awkward as a stick."

Draco wasn't sure where Pansy's intense dislike of Hermione Granger had come from – he rather thought something must have happened on the train, but he wasn't sure. He hadn't paid much attention to any of the Gryffindors, really, except to sneer at them in a partisan sort of way in Potions.

It was Potter's flying he wanted to see.

They'd fallen into a routine in the dorm. Harry talked to Vince and Gregory in a polite, distant sort of way, and Draco was happy to trade insults with Zabini when the other boy woke them all up in the mornings. But Harry and Draco never exchanged a word. If they ran into each other in the hallway on the way to the showers, they moved around each other with the air of people avoiding an empty patch of space. Sometimes Draco caught Harry watching him, but when Draco looked, Harry would always look away and say something random to somebody else. Draco only looked at Harry when he was almost sure Harry was too absorbed to look around.

As far as Draco knew, Harry had never brought up Voldemort since that first night. Draco had never heard the three of them talking about him, anyway, or about the Death Eaters or the war or anything else like that.

Draco hadn't been talking about those things either, but that didn't mean he hadn't been thinking about them. He'd tried to write to his mother three times. He finally finished a letter on Tuesday afternoon, before dinner.

Vince and Gregory were busy looking for the entrance to the kitchens. Draco would usually have helped them, but today he'd slipped away. He was curled up against the worn velvet curtains of the window seat near the Defence Against the Dark Arts classroom, looking out over the lawns of the castle. They were already growing dusky. Draco's wand cast the light of a warm _Lumos_ over his lap, and over the parchment balanced there.

He read the letter again.

_Dear Mother,_

_I hope you and Father are well. I'm settling into school, you'll be glad to know. We have a flying lesson next week. I expect I'll be brilliant. Vince is a bit worried, but I gave him extra lessons over Summer, and he hasn't fallen off in ages._

_I had a disagreement with somebody about the Dark Lord, and about that war War from when I was a baby. Father says that the Dark Lord had the right ideas. I don't want Wizarding Society to fall into chaos and decay. I know we have to protect our heritage._

_But the Death Eaters killed people. They did, didn't they? Kids, even._

_Your son,_

_Draco_

He looked at it. He hadn't asked a question, not really. He couldn't ask a question. He already felt uncomfortable and prickly about the implied criticism of Lucius, he couldn't ...

Before he could second-guess himself, Draco whistled quietly. Mercury left off nibbling at the curtains by his left arm and hopped into the light, bird eyes bright and curious.

"Here," Draco said, rolling the parchment up and fastening it to the owl's leg. "It's for Mother. Don't ... it's just for Mother, okay? No one else."

Mercury tilted his head to the side, unimpressed. He hopped onto Draco's shoulder, wings fluttering. Then he extended them properly and launched himself into the corridor behind Draco, disappearing into the dimness.

Draco bit down on the first knuckle of his thumb, trying to relax. He hadn't questioned anything really. He hadn't betrayed anybody. His father. Anybody.

*

Harry, Nott and Zabini were out for the evening. Draco suspected they'd gone to visit Hagrid again. Nott had apparently hero-worshipped him since he'd met Hagrid's dog – a brutish thing Draco had seen trotting at Hagrid's heels out on the grounds.

A lot of the upper-years were out too, doing something they'd carefully kept a secret from the lower-years, at a place they'd kept an even more careful secret. Draco was holding court over one end of the common room as a result, to an audience of first- and second-years, and even a few third-years, although they were pretending to play cards.

Draco was on edge, trying not to think about the letter, and it was making him play up to his audience more than usual. They'd started out talking about Quidditch, but Draco was mostly doing a dramatic re-enactment of the time he nearly got hit by a Muggle helicopter, now. He was sitting on the back of a couch, his foot pushing against Vince's knee.

"... After that I was safe for a bit, but I couldn't unhook my ankle from the door handle or I would have flown sideways into a spin; I could feel it." Draco curled his hand in the air, showing the motion of the wind. "I was just, no way was I letting go."

"The Muggle still couldn't see you?" a second-year boy asked, leaning forward.

Draco shook his head, wide-eyed and intent, holding his attention – everybody's attention. "I was pressed up against the side of the helicopter. There was a _blade_ above me, it already practically cut me in half once. Then..." He held their eyes, turning in a half circle. Pansy and the others were giggling, enthralled. Daphne nodded at him to continue, her eyes huge. "Then the helicopter started to turn, and the handle came out of my hand," Draco continued in a whisper.

Most of that hadn't actually happened. But it was a brilliant story.

"How did you escape?" Millicent Bulstrode demanded, her eyes narrowed.

Draco leaned back, stretching his hands behind his head. "I knew that the only way I could get out alive was if I could dive straight downwards, out of the helicopter's wake," he said. "But the only way I could do that was if I could slide downwards quickly enough to not get pushed back into the wake, or spin up into the stupid Muggle blade. I knew that I had to ... that I had to..."

Draco had noticed Potter, along with Zabini and Nott, standing just inside the common room. They must have been there a few minutes already, because Potter was watching him, one hand curled at his side. He looked absorbed, his mouth slightly open. His expression closed down as Draco stared.

Potter looked away, tugging the other two with him. They settled down in front of one of the other hearths.

"... I had to ... let go with my other hand," Draco said, distracted. He shook his head, turning away from Harry.

He finished the story, even though he couldn't keep his eyes from straying to Potter's couch. And he made it _good_, made it awesome; made sure it was clear just how amazing his flying had been. He invented a new part, too, where the Muggle noticed him and nearly crashed his helicopter.

His huge, comically scared eyes, playing the Muggle, were _brilliant_; Pansy and Daphne were laughing so much they were gasping.

Potter had started shooting him dark looks from under his brows. He was probably insulted on the Muggle's behalf. Good. Draco wanted him to be. Lucius would think this was funny; he'd pat Draco's shoulder, and his mouth would quirk at the corner.

"They don't understand much, Muggles," Draco drawled, smiling bright and mean. "That's why it's so easy for Wizards to kill them." He leaned back against the top of the couch, his impression becoming a Muggle cowering away from a wizard. "'Oh no, help me! There are people with spells! Save me!'"

The laughter was trickling away, people beginning to look uncertain. Draco couldn't stop. The tension under his skin was finally crackling loose. "'They have wands!'" he said. "'I don't know what to do against wands!'"

"Shut UP!" Potter surged to his feet, his eyes glittering. Draco pushed himself straight, staring back, daring him to do something.

"Just shut ... shut up, you ... _god_." Potter spun on his heel and stalked into the passageway that led to their dorm.

Draco curled his hands by his sides and watched him go.

Nott gave him a disgusted look and followed Harry.

Blaise Zabini stood and shook his head. He looked awed. "When you get carried away, you don't skimp, do you?" he murmured. Draco sneered at him. Zabini put his hands up in a pacifying gesture.

Pansy dropped onto the couch next to Draco, pulling him down with her.

"Hey," she said, tucking her chin onto his shoulder. "I liked the story better before that point."

"Sorry," Draco muttered.

She shrugged. "Yeah, all right." She shifted on the couch. "We should talk about strategy for the flying lesson. We need to make sure our best flyers are the ones closest to the Gryffindors."

Everybody else's attention was drifting away. Possibly Crabbe had been glaring at people – he looked very bland when Draco glanced his way.

"Yeah, okay," Draco said. He smiled slightly. "That means you're going to be right up against the stands, right?"

She nodded seriously. "Yes, but I'm planning to sprain my ankle a few minutes in anyway. I'll sit on the stands and practise undermining their confidence after that."

Pansy was born to be a general. Draco began to feel a bit better.

*

Nott, who had previously stayed out of the tension in their dorm, had started shooting Draco the same contemptuous looks as Potter did. Even Zabini seemed to be finding the situation less amusing than he had before.

Draco was doing a marvellous job of pretending he didn't know that any of them were alive, apart from the few times he couldn't help his eyes straying to their side of the dorm, their part of the common room. Something had happened at Hagrid's cabin, apparently – they'd found something out. Possibly it had been something about Professor Snape, since for some reason they'd taken to watching him with distrust. Snape _liked_ Nott, at least, but Nott seemed even more wary around him than Potter did. He slanted the professor long looks, and whispered things under his breath to Potter and Zabini.

Draco felt a savage jealousy twist into his stomach every time he saw them whispering together. They looked serious and determined. They looked self-contained, as though they had more important things to worry about than what the rest of their house was doing.

Except for the flying lesson. Nott and Zabini, at least, took that just as seriously as everybody else.

On the day, they turned up flanking Harry, a hand on each of his elbows, looking mysterious and smug. Harry kept ducking his head, embarrassed, and trying to shrug out of their hold.

"Seriously, guys, stop it!" he hissed. "I'm not that good. You're making me feel stupid."

Madam Hooch directed everybody to stand by one of the brooms laid out on the grass.

Pansy faked a coughing fit to remind people to take the positions she'd ordered, and Draco rolled his eyes but obeyed.

Potter looked startled to have Pansy snag his elbow and push him into a slightly different place. He blinked at her. Apparently he hadn't been paying attention during the planning sessions in the common room. Pansy smiled sweetly at him and ducked back to her own broom.

"It's embarrassing," Ron Weasley observed to Neville Longbottom in a loud whisper, "how ridiculous the Slytherins are about having Harry Potter in their house. Look at the way they can't stop touching him."

Harry flushed bright red. Longbottom looked too nervous to respond, though, or even hear what Weasley had said. He looked as though he was hyperventilating a bit, actually. Draco shot a look at Pansy to see if she'd noticed and was planning to take advantage of the weakness, but she was too busy giving Weasley a savagely dirty look. She tossed her head and looked away.

Madam Hooch strode around to the front. "Stick out your right hand over your broom," she directed, her voice a carrying bark, "and say 'Up!'"

Draco rolled his eyes at Daphne Greengrass next to him, because seriously, were they babies? Daphne's mouth twitched into a slight grin, but she looked a bit nervous. She must have been good, or Pansy wouldn't have put her out front, but she didn't seem very confident.

Her broom responded instantly when she said "Up!", though, just as Draco's did. The smack of the wood striking his palm was decidedly satisfying.

He shot his eyes over to the Gryffindor side of the class and was pleased to see that neither Granger nor Longbottom had got their brooms to rise. Dean Thomas, who was supposed to be Muggle-born, _had_ got his to rise, surprisingly, but only halfway – Draco saw him lunge forward to catch it before it dropped.

Pansy and Zabini, back against the stands, had taken advantage of being partly hidden to duck and grab their brooms off the ground, since they couldn't make them rise.

Hooch told them to mount, then she wandered along the rows, correcting people's grips. Draco didn't pay much attention – he was watching Potter out of the corner of his eye again, and yes, Potter _did_ look awfully confident, loosely gripping his broom before him – until she reached Draco. She frowned.

"Mr Malfoy, are you left handed?"

"What?" Draco asked. "No."

"Then you shouldn't have your right hand foremost," she said. "Your right is your steering hand, your left is to steady. Switch, now."

Draco gaped at her. "But ... I've been doing it this way for years. I've been flying since I was three years old."

"Then you've been doing it wrong for years," Hooch said, moving on.

Draco slanted a quick glance across at Potter, who was looking a bit amused. Then Potter seemed to notice that a couple of Gryffindors were snickering. He turned, giving them a very cold look.

Draco tried not to be warmed by the show of house solidarity.

Madam Hooch strode back to the front, clapping her hands. "Now," she called, "when I blow my whistle, you kick off from the ground, hard. Keep your brooms steady, rise a few feet and then come _straight back down_, by leaning forwards slightly." She stared hard to make sure they'd got that. "On my whistle. Three – two –"

Longbottom kicked off too soon. He rose straight up with ... well, with kind of an impressive display of speed, actually. Or it would have been impressive if it hadn't been so obvious that he had absolutely no control over it. His face was white and terrified as Madam Hooch shouted at him to _come back down_.

The assembled class stared up, craning their necks. An impossible distance up, Longbottom slipped sideways, his hands coming free, and he hurtled back towards the ground.

He hit it with a nasty sounding _crack_, sprawling face-first into the grass.

Draco felt his mouth drop open.

Madam Hooch hurried towards Longbottom and ran her wand over his prone form. He was starting to groan a bit, so at least he wasn't dead.

"Broken wrist," Hooch muttered. "Come on boy. It's all right, up you get."

She turned, distractedly ordering them not to touch their brooms while she was away, on pain of expulsion. Then she assisted Longbottom to his feet, leading him towards the hospital wing.

Draco was sort of worried that he was going to get a giggling fit, actually, now that it was over. Longbottom had looked so _ridiculous_. Draco pushed his hand over his mouth. "Did you see his _face_?" he demanded, his voice strangled. He gave up and began laughing for real.

Most of his housemates joined in, shock giving way to hilarity.

"Shut up, Malfoy," Parvati Patil snapped.

"_Ooh_," Pansy called, her smile bright and bitchy, "Sticking up for Longbottom? I never thought _you'd_ like fat little cry babies, Parvati."

Draco knew Pansy had known the Patils before school – he even had an idea they'd been friends. The dig obviously meant something to the two of them, because Parvati bit down on whatever reply she'd been going to make and glared instead, her cheeks reddening.

Draco was distracted from replying himself by a glint in the grass. He dropped his broom and darted forward, grabbing it out of the grass. It was a Remembrall – Longbottom had been flashing it around at breakfast, Draco remembered. It was sort of beautiful, and sort of completely funny looking. "It's that stupid thing Longbottom's gran sent him," he said, turning it over in his hands. He'd wanted to look at it up close when Longbottom got it this morning. He held it up so everyone could see.

Hermione Granger dropped her own broom and stepped forward. "Give it back," she demanded, pursing her lips.

Draco stared her down. "Oh?" he said. He tossed it from one hand to the other. "I might ... oh, I might leave it somewhere for Longbottom to collect," he said idly. "Like – say up a tree. That would be fun."

Daphne and Pansy both giggled. Vince and Gregory were snorting too.

"Don't you dare," Granger said, her voice shrill.

"Give it back to them," Potter said.

Granger's mouth snapped closed and she stared at him. Draco narrowed his eyes, switching his focus.

"So you're friends with Longbottom, now, Potter?" he demanded.

"No," Harry said, glaring, "but I'm not going to let you get away with being a total git, Malfoy."

Draco had been going to give it back eventually. Before Hooch came back. He certainly wasn't going to back down now, though.

He threw his leg over his broom and pushed off, rising quickly. Harry lunged towards him a second too late.

Draco pulled up around the topmost branches of an oak. "Come and get it, then!" he yelled.

"Madam Hooch told us not to move!" Hermione cried as Harry dove towards his own broom. "You'll get us _all_ in trouble!"

The rest of the class ignored her to crane their necks, watching the unfolding drama.

"Don't worry," Draco heard Seamus Finnegan observe, "it should be only the Slytherins who get in trouble. None of us are on brooms."

Draco ignored him.

Potter jumped onto the tatty school broom he'd been assigned and pushed off, sweeping smoothly upwards.

Draco couldn't help raising his eyebrows, even with the forewarning he'd had from Zabini and Nott. Potter's grip on the broom was firm and relaxed. He rose in a beautiful circular sweep, his hair whipping into his eyes, as though he'd known brooms all his life.

Nott and Zabini were whooping from below, and there was a piercing wolf whistle that Draco was willing to bet money was Pansy.

Harry drew up a few feet away, pushing the hair away from his eyes. "Give it here," he said, a threat in his voice. And then, obviously deciding that he needed an actual threat as well, "Or I'll knock you off that broom!"

Draco lifted his chin, adrenalin humming just under his skin. "Oh yeah?"

Potter tilted his broom and shot forward, forcing Draco to dive out of the way. Draco twisted to the side, panting, and met Harry's eyes again for a second. Then he pushed away and off, tearing around the side of the tree.

Potter came after him immediately. Draco swerved, making for the battlements of the East Tower, and Harry dove underneath him, forcing him to twist into a half somersault in the air. He heard Harry laugh, the sound almost whipped away by the wind, and then he was into the crumbling stonework, skimming low over the roof.

He hadn't flown like this in years.

It was _fantastic_.

He shot a look behind him, catching Harry's eyes. They were shining like he thought his own were, wolfish and determined.

"Don't drop it, now!" Harry called, his tone jeering, and Draco flipped upwards, forcing Harry to follow.

He was heading back towards the Quidditch field now, and Potter was gaining on him. Potter was _better_ than Draco, Draco could feel it, and normally he would have hated that, but right now adrenaline was singing in his veins and he just wanted to fly forever.

Potter was going to catch him in a moment, though, and Draco still had a point to prove.

He swerved around, pulling up so that Harry overshot him. Draco straightened on his broomstick, getting partway to his knees. "Catch it if you can!" he shouted, and tossed the glinting ball upwards.

Then he angled his broom and sped back towards the grass.

He touched down too hard, his knees buckling, and slid off his broom. He twisted around, in time to see ...

Oh, wow. Wow.

Harry was speeding towards the field, one hand stretched out. The Remembrall was an impossible tiny shape half a second away from hitting the ground and breaking into shards.

Potter's fingers closed around it moments before it could hit, and Potter's broom levelled out, his school shoes skidding along the grass. The broom stopped and Harry gently toppled off, flopping onto his back with the Remembrall still clutched in his fist.

Even the Gryffindors were cheering him. The Slytherins seemed to have decided that the whole thing had been a stunt and were cheering _both_ of them – Daphne dropped down and threw her arm around Draco's shoulder, squeezing him excitedly.

"HARRY POTTER!" a breathless voice shouted.

Draco turned to see Professor McGonagall hurrying across the field towards them. Draco and Harry both got to their feet, brushing grass off their robes. McGonagall didn't seem to notice Draco – she was focused on Harry. Not surprising, given the stunt he'd just pulled.

"_Never,_" she panted, reaching them, "in all my time at Hogwarts – you might have broken your _neck_, young man."

Potter looked as though he was trying to sink into the ground. "Er," he said.

McGonagall panted, hands on her hips. She seemed to be struggling with something. "Never do that again," she said, glaring. She tapped her fingers on her wand. Finally she added, "You should ... tell Professor Snape about this. He might be interested."

She said the words as though they had an unpleasant taste. Still, for whatever reason, she wasn't handing out detentions. Draco was grateful.

McGonagall turned her gaze over the rest of the class. "Why on earth are you unsupervised?"

Later, after the interrupted flying class was finally finished, Draco overheard Nott asking Potter whether he'd tell Snape about what had happened, as McGonagall had advised.

Harry snorted. "Tell Snape about how I was breaking rules? Yeah, no, actually. I don't think so."

"She might have meant Snape would let you join the Slytherin Quidditch team early, if he knew how good you were," Nott offered.

Potter gave Nott a look. Zabini laughed softly. "Yeah, so he probably wouldn't," he said to Harry, pushing his shoulder against Nott's. "He doesn't like you much."

Nott flushed. "He's not that bad. Other than the part where he's an ex-D–" He noticed Draco listening and stopped, glaring at him.

Draco raised his eyebrows and feigned indifference, turning back to Vince and Gregory.

"You did good," Draco told Vince.

"Yeah," Vince said. His own smile was small and private, and made Draco suddenly intensely proud of the extra lessons he'd given him.

Draco looked back again at Potter, Nott and Zabini, ducking into the common room ahead of them. The excitement of flying had drained away, but it had left a new sort of feeling. Less desperate, but sadder.

They could almost have been friends, up there in the air. Draco wondered if Potter had felt like that.

Mercury swooped in just as Draco was about to step into the common room. Draco caught sight of the white curl of parchment around his foot and felt his stomach lurch. Mercury landed on his shoulder and pecked at his hair, friendly today. He very rarely had the patience to hold onto mail until breakfast. Draco wasn't sure whether he was glad or not, in this case.

He petted Mercury for a moment, his fingers carding in the soft feathers of his neck, his eyes on the scroll in his hand. Draco's name in his mother's elegant hand was easily visible along one edge.

Mercury teased at his hair again. Draco turned his face and rubbed his cheek against Mercury's beak in thanks – because his owl wasn't affectionate often, and Draco liked it. Then he extended his arm, flexing his shoulder to gently dislodge the bird.

Mercury launched himself away with a low hoot, winging down the corridor on his way back up to the owlery.

Draco turned the scroll over in his hand for a moment. Then he turned on his heel, making for somewhere less crowded than the Slytherin common room. He didn't want to read this with anyone watching him.

He fetched up in the abandoned Entrance Hall, sliding down to sit against one of the pillars. It was cold, but not too cold. Draco shrugged his robes more securely around him and pushed his knees up, resting his elbows on them. He opened the scroll, pressing it against the humped shape of his knees.

_Dear Draco,_

_I am glad you are settling in. Your father and I are both well. Please write again and tell me how the flying lesson went. I expect you were splendid, unless you froze up. If you froze up, I expect you'll be splendid next time._

Draco bit his lip. He wasn't sure that 'Stole somebody's Remembrall and got into a shouting match with Gryffindors and risked expulsion to bait Harry Potter, then got completely outflown by him and fell off own broom while landing' really came under the heading of 'freezing up'. He suspected it didn't come under the heading of being splendid either.

_I don't think I have ever told you this story, but when I first went away to school I knew exactly what subject was going to be my favourite. It was going to be Divination – in particular, the branch of Divination known as Death Reading. I wasn't able to begin it until third year, when we chose electives, but I was entirely sure that that was what I would choose. In third year – and fourth and fifth, as well – I took Divination, along with my two best friends. We specialised in reading animal entrails, and asking questions about the darkness within all souls, and the death that inhabited all life. We wore black eye liner and black head scarves that almost covered our eyes, and we practised speaking in monotone._

_It was a phase, darling; one I hope you never feel the need to go through._

_Eventually I came to the realisation that animal entrails were less glamorous than I had first believed, that black eye-liner didn't suit me, and that none of the predictions I had made in the last three years stood the least chance of coming true. It was a realisation that took three years to arrive at simply because I had believed that it was what I wanted for so many years beforehand that it had become a rather essential part of the way I defined myself. It was a relief to admit that it had all been dreadful tosh._

_Occasionally people are unwilling to ever admit this. Sometimes they believe so firmly at first in the nobility of what they are doing that they can never be brought to acknowledge that, in the end, all that it was was unpleasant and messy and the cause of stains that are extremely difficult to get off your hands. They must continue to believe in the nobility, even years later._

_This is tiresome, but forgivable. But there is no need for the people around them to believe along with them._

_You are an intelligent boy, Draco. You will come to your own conclusions._

_All my love,_

_Your mother,_

_Narcissa Malfoy_

Draco folded the letter, then unfolded it again.

He was trembling slightly.

_You are an intelligent boy_, his mother had written. Draco almost didn't want to be intelligent; didn't want to understand the story she'd told.

Wasn't his mother supposed to be loyal to his father? _Draco_ might doubt him (sometimes, maybe), but shouldn't Narcissa discourage that? How could she _say_ such things?

_She says it's all right. She says I'm allowed to think he's wrong. She says I'm allowed to be friends with ..._

 

That didn't mean Draco had to be disloyal; just because Narcissa was.

He shoved the letter into the pocket of his robes, pushing himself to his feet. It was almost time for dinner anyway.

*

Over the weeks that followed, Draco read the letter so many times that he knew it by heart. He wrote back to his mother, and to his father too, and didn't refer to the previous letter once, even to Narcissa. He wrote about the flying lesson (carefully edited); about Slytherin's chances at the Quidditch Cup; about how well he was doing in Potions; about Pansy's rivalry with the Gryffindors (mostly Hermione Granger and Parvati Patil); about all the quills Gregory had blown up instead of levitating; about how Draco missed breakfasts at the manor, and there was nothing to drink except pumpkin juice here.

He looked for cryptic advice in Narcissa's replies to his letters, but apparently she'd finished giving him advice. _You will come to your own conclusions_ was still her final word.

Draco didn't like his own conclusions. He was trying to avoid them.

Narcissa never mentioned the way his letters were completely free of Harry Potter, after the way he'd talked and talked about him before school started. He knew she noticed – she always noticed – but there was nothing to indicate it from her letters.

Crabbe and Goyle got used to Draco unfolding and rereading _the_ letter, the first one, at odd points during the day, and Pansy didn't try to read over his shoulder after the first time. Potter seemed to be ridiculously curious, though. Draco kept catching him sneaking looks at the parchment in Draco's hand, when he took it out to read it in bed or at breakfast. Draco didn't know why. He was sort of trying to ignore Potter, actually, while he sorted out ... this.

The worst part about not referring to the letter when he owled home was that he couldn't ask his mother to send him photographs of herself in her Death Divination phase. He sort of thought they might be hysterical, and he was fairly sure she'd humour him if he actually asked.

She did send him a package with twelve cases of sparkling apple juice, after he complained about the pumpkin juice. He was especially grateful for them on Halloween morning, when he came down to breakfast to find that not just the juice but _everything_ was pumpkin. There were live bats swooping around, too. There was some sort of spell to stop them from making a mess on the tables, but Draco was still constantly ducking to avoid leathery wings catching in his hair. They also smelt which, combined with all the pumpkin, made Draco feel a bit ill.

He pushed away his breakfast. A moment later the double doors slammed open and Professor Quirrell came dashing into the hall. His face was white and twisted with fear. His ridiculous purple turban was askew.

He skidded up to the high table, his breath coming short and fast. "Troll," he gasped, holding onto the table. "In the dungeons – thought you ought to know."

He slipped to his knees in a faint and toppled sideways.

There was immediate uproar, the entire hall breaking into frightened, loud voices. Students at every table were getting to their feet, hovering ready to run.

Professor Dumbledore shot purple firecrackers into the swirling crowd of bats, making them scatter. It added to the confusion of noise more than anything else, but it also startled people enough to make them look around.

"Prefects," Dumbledore called, his voice an amplified rumble, "lead your Houses back to the dormitories immediately!"

The Slytherin prefects gave each other rather blank looks. Their dormitories were in the dungeons, and there was no way any of them were going to head _towards_ the troll.

Snape appeared at their table in a swirl of black robes. "Congregate in the Defence Against the Dark Arts practice room and bar the doors, you idiots," he snapped. Then he was gone, sweeping onwards.

The prefects jolted into action. Daphne Greengrass's older sister took charge of the first years, pinning Daphne to her side with what looked like painful thoroughness. Daphne squeaked a bit. "This way!" her sister called. "It'll be a bit crowded, but the practice room's big enough for all sixty of us. Move!"

Pansy was having hysterics. Daphne kept trying to crane around to check on her, but Millicent Bulstrode was doing a fairly good job of towing Pansy along, despite her sobs and gulping breaths.

"I thought trolls were really stupid," Gregory said in a low, worried voice as they let themselves be herded out. "How did it get in?"

"Maybe someone let it in for Halloween?" Draco said. "Or maybe it stumbled in through a secret passage – one of the ones your sister told us about."

Draco and the others hadn't found any of the passages – they hadn't even found the kitchens yet – but they had found some pretty odd rooms while they were looking. The three of them had stumbled into a stone cell lined with nothing but glass cabinets full of wooden toothbrushes, last week. Draco hadn't expected he'd ever find toothbrushes so creepy.

They were in the East Corridor on the second floor when the whole disorganised train of students fumbled to a stop. Somebody was shouting up ahead, and Draco heard Peeves' distinctive cackle. Draco tried to see, but he was several feet too short. Peeves must have been doing something to block the corridor, though. The first years shuffled about, peering into the shadowed empty classrooms to either side.

Pansy had been getting more and more overwrought, and the delay broke her nerves. "We have to get to the practice room." She clung to Millicent's shoulders. "We can't stay here!"

"Buck up, Parkinson," Millicent said. She sounded uncomfortable. "There are sixty of us; I don't think the troll's going to take us on."

Pansy didn't seem to even hear her. She was looking around, her head turning from side to side, her breath coming shorter and shorter.

"I heard a noise!" she gasped. "I heard – it's coming –" With a choked cry she broke and ran, her heels flashing as she fled into the dusty unused classroom behind her, and through the door on the far side.

Draco cursed and took off after her, aware that Millicent and one or two other people were doing the same.

"Wha– Parkinson!" Daphne's sister yelled from behind. "Malfoy! Bulstrode! _Potter!_ Get back here!"

Draco dashed through the far door and almost ran into Pansy. She was standing rigid, staring towards the shadows beyond the staircase at the end of the broad landing they were on. It was an old staircase, wooden, creaking. But there was a noise, coming faintly from _somewhere_ – beyond the foot of the stairs, maybe, around the corner? – that wasn't a staircase creaking. It was a rhythmic thump, followed by a rasping drag. Draco's mind immediately supplied him with the pictures of trolls from his nursery books: malformed, gnarly and huge, dragging a club one-handed behind them.

Potter came up behind him, catching himself on the door frame as he skidded, and Millicent was a moment behind. Nott and Zabini followed at a more cautious pace. Crabbe and Goyle must have been caught by Daphne's sister before they could follow.

"What –" Zabini started, and then fell silent, hearing the same thing they were. His haughty, dark face went a little paler. "Troll?" he asked quietly. "Where – where is it?"

"I don't know," Pansy said, her voice hoarse. "It – I thought it was on the floor below, but then it seemed – I _hate_ this castle's acoustic, I hate it!"

"Shh," Millicent said. She maybe meant to sound soothing, but it came out as a bit of a bark. Which was – was an achievement, with sybilants, Draco though, slightly hysterically.

Nott shifted, biting his lip. He looked back the way they'd come. "We should go back," he said. "We should go back quickly."

Draco looked at Harry. Harry was staring ahead. "No," he said. "The teachers need to know where the troll is. We need – I think we'd be able to see from the top of the stairs, maybe."

He gave the rest of them a quick glance. Then he started to creep forward.

Draco hesitated for barely a second before he started creeping after Harry. He wasn't going to hang back if Potter wasn't afraid.

Harry gave him a sideways look, self-conscious, then away again. There was a tiny quirk to his mouth that was almost a smile.

The stairs _did_ creak. Draco had never heard creaks so devastatingly loud in the stillness of the air. He expected at every moment that the troll would hear and turn; come roaring up at them, club swinging, feet shaking the floor.

At the top of the stairs they leaned over the balcony. For a moment Draco couldn't make anything out – everything was shadows, dimly lit stairs and hallways, and Draco didn't know this part of the castle at all – then Harry sucked in his breath and Draco saw something move.

The troll looked small from here, from above like this – it looked grey and wizened. It was two landings below them, snuffling down the length of a dusty platform. It wasn't heading towards Pansy and the others, Draco noted with relief.

It moved out of sight as they watched.

They looked back down at the others, an anxious knot by the far doorway. Draco pointed, mouthing _Two floors down_, holding up two fingers. Millicent nodded, businesslike, and started herding Pansy, Nott and Zabini back the way they'd come.

Harry glanced at Draco, and they started edging back down the stairs.

This was a _really_ old staircase, old enough for the magic to be crotchety and capricious. The handrail shifted under Draco's fingers, and he could feel that the stairs were twisting around to deposit them somewhere else. Harry turned around and rolled his eyes at Draco. Then the stairs shifted again, and Harry and Draco both stepped onto the same step.

Which melted into a trick step and tipped them through the staircase.

They tumbled in a painful tangle of limbs, falling into another corridor. Draco twisted to look up in time to see the staircase finish shifting about, smoothly covering the gap they'd fallen through.

Draco looked rather blankly at Harry. Harry was in the process of untangling his legs, pushing back to sit and lean against the wall.

"This castle," Harry said, lifting his head. "This castle is so _weird_." And he started giggling, pushing his fist against his mouth.

Draco felt the tension of the last few minutes gather in his stomach and push up into giggles of his own. He pressed his face against his knees, muffling the breathless laughter.

"That – we stalked a troll," Draco said.

Harry's laughter hiccoughed to a stop after a minute. Draco sneaked a look at him, and found him looking at the fabric of his robes over his knees. He'd gone quiet and withdrawn, again, the line of his back stiff, as if he'd forgotten for a moment that he hated Draco, but now he'd remembered.

Draco got up, feeling awkward. "We should – I've never seen this part of the castle," he said, not looking at Harry. "We should try to get back."

"Yeah," Harry said. He didn't make eye contact either.

The corridor they were in was shadowed with the overhang of the staircase – still there even though the stairs themselves had moved on – but it grew more open and better lit a short distance along.

They looked up, but there was no chink of light, no sign of any gap up there at all. Even supposing they could have somehow climbed back up, there was nowhere to go.

"I don't think we're going to get out like that," Harry said quietly.

"The troll's out there anyway," Draco said. "It probably – it might have heard the noise we made when we fell through here." He chewed his lip. "The others are all right, though, don't you think?"

"They were heading back," Potter said. His voice was firm, even though he still wasn't looking at Draco. "They'll be with the other Slytherins again by now."

Draco looked up the corridor again. "There'll be another way out," he said. "There's always – I mean, the castle's full of secret corridors, everyone knows that."

Harry nodded, and after a moment they fell into step. When Draco glanced across, Harry had his hands shoved deep inside the pockets of his robes.

The light was coming from high, dustily gleaming fixtures, Draco realised – far higher than the physical dimensions of the floor above ought to have allowed. Peering up, Draco could see that they were white globes supported by sinuous bronze shapes – castings of fantastical, abstract beasts with curling tails and wide, globulous bronze eyes. The long tapestry beside Draco was so thick with what looked like centuries of grime that he could barely make out what was in it. He thought it was a Quidditch scene. Their shoes left faint impressions in the dust on the floor, too. This was obviously not a part of the castle that was used to students.

Phoebe Goyle had told Draco and the others that these parts of the castle sometimes ... went a bit native.

Draco glanced at the tapestry again. He could see the dimly coloured shapes of tapestry figures turning to look back at him. One made a little dash forward, her staring face clear for a moment, then fell back again.

Draco took his wand out, holding it cradled comfortingly in the palm of his hand.

The corridor they were in gave way to a small landing with a short diagonal flight of stairs that led down to a crosswise corridor, and another corridor that cut off at an angle.

Harry glanced at Draco. His hands were still pushed inside his pockets so tightly that his shoulders were high and stiff. Draco bit the inside of his cheek.

"Let's go down the middle one, then," Harry said.

Harry's black uniform hat was crumpled at the crown, Draco noticed as he crowded down the steps after Harry. _You look like a vagabond, Potter_, he thought. In his head, Harry laughed at him, throwing a grin over his shoulder.

Draco pulled his own hat further over his forehead, looking down once more.

The new corridor changed direction again after a few paces, then opened out into a long hall. There were pale blue drapes hung along the walls, which fluttered without any breeze that Draco could feel. Draco only noticed them on his second look around: his first went to the dozens of stiff suits of armour stretching in haphazard rows the length of the hall. They were as dusty as the floor, gleaming dully beneath moth-eaten red and blue plumes. They were made in all different kinds of styles: some simple and some inlaid and delicate, occasionally with bizarre metal skirts. Draco had a hazy idea, from the armoury he'd seen around the manor growing up, that they were probably from a lot of different centuries.

"Where do you think we are?" Harry asked. "In relation to – I don't know, the library, or the Astronomy Tower?"

Draco had no idea. "I don't know. Maybe above the library?"

"I wonder how long it's been since anyone was here?" Harry said, his voice quiet.

A few of the suits of armour were shuffling sleepily, disturbed by Draco and Harry's presence. One tall, knobbly suit in the corner scraped a metal arm over its visor as though it was wiping its nose.

Potter was already starting forward through the rows of armour, so Draco followed.

The metal figures shuffled more as they moved through the hall, shin guards creaking as they shifted, empty visors turning towards the two of them.

_These parts of the castle can go a bit native_, Draco thought.

Potter half turned back towards Draco. "I think –"

"Watch out!" Draco shouted.

The suit of armour behind Harry, the one with wide shoulder plates and a gold insert down its forehead and flared nose, had swung around, raising the pike in its hand.

Harry stumbled backwards, avoiding the downward sweep of the pike, and fell onto his bum. The armour tilted its visor, chin dropping, and advanced with a scraping metal stride. Harry scrabbled backwards. Draco seized his arms and pulled him to his feet. They stumbled against each other as they backed away.

The other suits of armour were creaking and groaning as they shifted, as though they were waking up. Draco grabbed Harry's hand and they ran towards the door on the far side of the hall, dodging the scattered rows of armour. Draco knocked against one with his shoulder, painfully, and it turned around, reaching to seize hold of him. He dodged again, breath coming fast.

The shoulder-plated suit was chasing them, ponderous but long-strided. Draco twisted to look, knocking against another metal suit, and his heart almost stopped at how close behind them it was. In desperation, he flailed his wand out and cast a leg locker curse behind him. Harry, beside him, had got hold of his own wand, and he cast _Wingardiam Leviosa_ at the same time – the charm Professor Flitwick had been teaching their class this week.

The metal suit's legs clanged together, and it sailed a few feet in the air, crashing into another suit. Helmets and breastplates came loose, clanging across the floor. The noise was as loud as if the entire room were falling apart. Then they were at the door, and Harry was slamming it closed behind them, and pushing the bolt across.

He leaned on it, panting. "That – they – the suits of armour in the main hall never attack people!"

Draco leaned his hands on his knees, doubled over. "These parts of the castle," he said. "If they don't get visited for ages, they can go dangerous. That's – that's what I've heard."

Harry stuttered a laugh. "If – if you have to fall through the stairs to get in here, I bet they don't get visited much."

Draco pushed his fringe out of his eyes, smiling at Harry a bit. His heart rate was beginning to slow down. "I bet there are hundreds of places like this in the castle," he said. "That you can only get to by something weird like falling through the stairs." He tried to make his voice casual. "Do you think we could find them, if we looked?"

He shot a look at Potter, and saw the smile slide slowly off his face. The other boy looked away, pushing his hands back into his pockets. He shrugged. His shoulders had gone tight again.

"Come on," Potter said after a moment. "I want to find the way back."

Draco glared at his own shoes, and didn't say anything. He started walking again when Harry did.

It was starting to feel as though they were going to be wandering in twisting stone corridors until they graduated. They avoided any turnings where they could spot suits of armour leaning against the walls – Draco had never noticed how many corridors had them, before – and Draco kept an eye on the statues that loitered around at the feet of most stairs, too. They seemed to be snoozing, though: there was only one, a witch with a cat wrapped around her head like a turban, who turned with a creak of stone to look at them, a stone hand coming up to steady the cat.

But the turnings themselves were becoming trickier, as if the castle was getting into a bit of a mood. Draco lost count of the number of times they turned down perfectly straight-looking corridors only to find that they branched sharply back the way they'd come a short distance down, or that they simply stopped, at a door or even at nothing – a landing with no stairs, only dim nothingness below them.

Potter still wasn't talking to or even really looking at Draco, except in sideways glances to decide which turning to take. Those glances were wary and quiet, and made Draco want to – he didn't even know. He wanted to do something, anything, to make Harry look at him properly; something to fix the low, coiling ball of misery lodged in his own stomach.

He hunched his shoulders, instead, and pretended a deep interest in the tapestry they were walking past. It showed a feast scene. It sort of made Draco hungry. They hadn't got to finish breakfast. And it had all been pumpkin anyway.

The castle hadn't done anything tricky for the last couple of turnings, and Draco was beginning to relax, when the ancient wooden door they'd just passed through slammed shut behind them. They spun around. Harry immediately tried the handle, then _Alohamora_, with no luck.

They gave each other uneasy glances, turning back to see what they'd been locked into.

The path in front of them was only half there.

It was dim, and difficult to see details – the only light came from high, slitted windows – but they could see the important parts. The corridor they'd been walking down had opened out onto a ledge, with a low wooden railing on one side, leading around the edge of a central stairwell, with no stairs. The ledge crumbled to nothing not very many steps away, the railing hanging out at a drunken angle. A little further along it started up again, then crumbled once more.

There were also two criss-crossing walkways extending across the void. There were no railings, though they were broad enough for three people to walk next to each other. But, and Draco's stomach swooped unpleasantly as he watched, they only seemed to have enough reality between them for maybe one solid walkway. Parts of them kept fading to pale grey in the dimness and then to nothing, before fading back again.

Draco swallowed, and looked at Harry. "Uh."

Harry looked back at him.

"How strong is your _Wingardiam Leviosa_?" Draco asked, fiddling with the cuff of his sleeve.

Harry bit his lip. "Um. Really not strong enough?"

Draco nodded. "Yeah. Mine too." They looked back at the drop in front of them.

"Do you think..." Harry said after a moment. Draco glanced at him and he was biting his lip again. Harry pushed the hair out of his eyes, frowning. "The supports are still there. Do you think ... maybe the walkways could still be there too, even when they fade?"

Draco looked hard at them. There were spells you could cast to determine whether you were looking at an illusion, he knew. He didn't know how to cast any of them.

"Maybe?" Draco chewed on his lip, and neither of them pointed out the really, really obvious break in the footpath right before the place where the closest walkway started, which would mean they'd have to leap from the path onto the walkway, and ... trust that it was there. There was no way to check first.

Draco was maybe starting to hyperventilate slightly.

There was a yawn behind him. Draco spun around, his wand coming up. The witch in the painting on the wall behind him blinked at him, one hand fluttering over her mouth. The other hand was petting the neck of a unicorn, which lifted its head to give Draco the most unimpressed look he'd ever received from a painting.

"Are you going to starve to death here?" the witch asked. She gave the unicorn in her lap another pat. "There were bones, once, do you remember, sweet? Two little students turning to bones." She looked up, her eyes wide. "It was tragic. But not very pretty, by the end, and I like pretty things."

The painted unicorn snuffled, seeking her hand once more.

Potter had come up to stand at Draco's shoulder.

"Is ... excuse me, but are the missing bits of walkway an illusion?" he asked the witch.

She looked back down at the unicorn. "Oh, no, that would be telling," she said.

Draco glared, putting as much haughtiness in it as he could. "That was why we asked," he said. "We'd rather not _fall to our deaths_ trying to get out of here, you see."

She looked up again, and Draco was amazed that a painted face could look so amused. She petted the unicorn's mane again. "Aren't they funny, sweet?" she said.

Draco let the staring match go on for another minute. Then his shoulders slumped and he turned back to the walkways.

"If we run, we might make it the whole distance without having to find out whether it's illusion or not," Harry said quietly.

Draco gave him a sideways look. He didn't think he could run that fast, but ...

Bones. Two students turning to bones. Draco wasn't going to turn to bones.

"Yeah," he exhaled. "Yeah, okay."

Harry shot him a quick, nervous grin, and grabbed his hand. "All right," he said. "I'll count three, and we'll jump onto the walkway."

Draco nodded. They were squeezing hands so tightly that Draco's hand felt numb.

"One," Harry said. "Two..." Draco leaned forward, tensing his shoulders, feeling Harry do the same. "Three!"

 

They dashed forward at the same time, launching out over the gap. Draco felt his feet hit solid stone, and then they were running, shoulders bumping and arms close to their bodies, school shoes pounding against the stone.

Draco ran with his heart in his mouth. They were only halfway across when, oh god, the floor beneath his feet began to go thin and papery. Harry pulled him violently onto the other walkway, crossing this one a foot in front of them. Draco fell against him, his arm almost shaking out of its socket. This walkway had faded out at the far end, and there was nowhere further to go.

Harry was breathing fast and hotly panicked in his ear. They waited, stiff and trembling, for the walkway they were standing on to disappear, or for the one they'd just come off to come back.

They happened at the same time. That giving, paper-thin feeling crept into the floor just as the cross-way went from dark nothingness to an almost-there stone grey. They jumped, and for a moment Draco thought they'd jumped too soon. The floor gave terrifyingly under his feet, and Draco stumbled to his knees. Then it was solid stone again. Harry tugged Draco to his feet and they were running. Draco couldn't hear anything but the pounding of his own heartbeat in his ears.

Then there was the stone ledge ahead of them, and an open doorway, and Draco was stumbling down the short flight of steps beyond before he even realised they'd made it.

Harry tumbled after him. They landed in a tangle of limbs against a tapestry woven in warm reds and golds. They were in another corridor, brightly lit and reassuringly solid, and Draco's legs were trembling so badly that he didn't think he could ever get to his feet again.

"Wow," Harry said. His voice shook. He leaned into Draco's shoulder. Then he was shaking harder, laughing. "Oh my god. Wow."

Draco leaned back, gulping in breaths, shaking. "That was so crazy," Draco breathed. "That was – that was crazier than I've ever been. That was _insane_."

Harry twisted against him. "We made it, though," he said, and the smile was so broad it had to _hurt_. "That was – we made it."

Draco shook his head. He wanted to smile back at Harry but he was shaking too hard. "The ... the unicorn woman doesn't get to see us turn to bones," Draco said, and then he started laughing too, and it wasn't funny at all but if he didn't laugh Draco was going to fold into a ball and not get up again.

After a minute he heard Harry's laughter die away.

Draco sucked in a breath, deep and careful, and sneaked a look at him.

Harry was watching him, but he looked away as soon as Draco looked back. Harry was stiff again, his shoulder tense against Draco's. He didn't look at Draco as he scrambled to his feet, brushing down his robes.

"Anyway," he said; quiet, subdued. "Come on."

Draco couldn't stand it, not again. He scrambled to his feet too, staring at the back of Harry's neck. Then he turned and kicked the wall next to him.

"Look, I'm _sorry_." Draco kicked at the wall again, watching a stag in the border of the tapestry by his foot startle and dart away. "I'm not – I shouldn't – the Dark Lord was wrong, okay? He shouldn't have tried to kill you, or – he shouldn't have killed people."

Draco hadn't even realised that he'd made up his mind until he found himself saying it. And then it sounded so stupid, out loud, so obvious, that he realised that he'd known for a while, what he really thought.

He sneaked a look at Harry. Harry looked a bit incredulous. "Really," Harry said.

Draco shrugged and looked away. "He shouldn't – I wouldn't follow someone who did that," he said quietly. "Not – I shouldn't have said that, what I said."

There was a scuffing sound, and Draco sneaked another look at Harry. Harry was dragging the heel of his shoe on the ground, scowling at it. "What about what your dad says?" he asked finally, not looking at Draco.

Draco bit his lip. He wasn't – he wouldn't – he might _think_ it, but he wasn't going to say it out loud, that his father was wrong, he _wasn't_.

There was a long silence, and then another rustle as Harry moved. Draco chanced a look at him and found him sitting down on the second-to-bottom step of the short flight they'd fallen down before. He was hugging his knee and watching Draco. He didn't look so angry, though. He glanced down at his own knee, then back up, peering at Draco from under the messy line of his fringe.

"Your dad, right?" he said.

Draco remembered that Harry didn't have one.

Draco shrugged. "I'm sorry," he said again.

Harry looked down at his knee once more. He fiddled with the edge of his sleeve. "Would you," he said after a long moment. "Can you tell me the rest of the story about the helicopter some time?" He looked up, flushing, and looked away again. "I only got to hear the end of it."

Draco could feel a warmth spreading through him, breaking out of him in an enormous, dorky grin. He bit down on it, but it came out again. He gave up and beamed at Harry. Harry looked up again and caught it. He flushed again.

"Yeah," Draco said. "Yeah. If you like. I"ll – if you like."

Harry rolled his eyes, still red, but grinned back. Then he blinked, his gaze focusing beyond Draco. "Hey," he said, "isn't that the entrance hall to the library?"

It was a doorway a few paces down the corridor, with three steps up to it. The two boys scrambled through it, turning to look behind them, and found that they'd crawled through the painting of an old wizard crocheting a hat. He glared at them, shaking the blue-and-yellow wool in his lap.

"Huh," Harry said. They turned around. There were a couple of students coming out of the library, chatting to each other, arms full of books.

"I wonder if that means someone caught the troll?" Draco asked.

*

It had been Professor Sprout who brought the troll down, they found out in the common room that evening. Draco had already told the story of his and Harry's adventures, with Harry interrupting to laugh at him and to object to exaggerations, and Draco had decided he was willing to hear everybody else's stories now. He sat on the back of the couch, his feet pushed under the seat cushions. Harry was sitting on the couch properly, Draco's legs pressed up against his side.

"They eventually found it in a girls' _bathroom_," Millicent Bulstrode said. "How strange is that? Do you think trolls need to use the bathroom? The _girls'_ bathroom?"

"Maybe it was a girl troll," Harry offered.

"Imagine if there'd been somebody in there," Draco said, "sitting on the loo."

Daphne gave a little shriek. "Oh, oh, gross, oh."

Gregory and Vince were sitting against the end of the other couch, the one Millicent and Daphne were on. They looked quietly pleased. Theo Nott was still looking at Draco kind of suspiciously, but Blaise Zabini just looked amused.

Pansy was fully occupied in being embarrassed at her hysterics over the troll. She was squeezed onto the couch next to Harry, her face buried in his shoulder. Harry had given her an extremely startled look at first, but Pansy seemed to have decided that Harry and Draco making up meant that Harry, by extension, was Pansy's to lean on in the same way that Draco was.

Harry himself was wearing a wide, amazingly happy smile and leaning against Draco's leg, grinning at Daphne's pantomime of retching.

"There was a troll that got into my aunt's pantry, once," Nott said, leaning on the couch behind Daphne. "It got in, but then it couldn't work the door handle to get out again, and it just ploughed right through the wall."

"Well, anything can happen in the wilds of Devonshire," Zabini drawled. "Trolls roaming the countryside, banshees in the chimney stacks – it's a dangerous place."

Nott shoved him. "Rather than _London_, you mean, where you grew up, where it was _so_ wild?"

Draco rocked back on his hands, happiness curling low and comfortable in his stomach. He was only half paying attention to the conversation, now. He shifted his leg closer to Harry. After a moment Harry tilted his head to rest on Draco's knee, the motion self-conscious but comfortable. Draco began composing a letter in his head.

_Dear Mother,_

_There was a troll in the castle today. Harry and I nearly ran right into it. We got into this part of the castle that never gets visited ..._


End file.
